Bus Depot Is On the Market
The East Hampton School District’s bus parking lot and maintenance depot, which is at 41 Route 114, has been put up for sale, leaving the district, which leases the property, in a quandary. Although the school board met on Tuesday, an anticipated discussion of the options did not take place.
Listed at $3 million by Town and Country Real Estate, the one-acre site is owned by the Schaefer family of East Hampton, which operated a bus company there that serviced schools until 2006. The property has two buildings, one measuring 3,000 square feet, another of about 3,600 square feet, ample parking, and it is zoned for commercial-industrial use, which allows trade sites, repair shops, storage, and exercise studios.
Richard Burns, the district superintendent, said after the meeting that the district was interested in the property. “I’m going to be contacting people. It depends on the price. There are so many variables.” Also speaking after the meeting, J.P. Foster, the school board president, said, “We have to explore every option. We’re just gathering information at this point.”
The school board had held an executive session prior to the meeting, but did not state what the general topic of the session would be.
The East Hampton School District began operating its own buses when the Schaefers went out of business, and in October 2015 the board began discussing building a bus depot on its own property. The district pays approximately $103,000 a year to rent the Schaefer site.
A separate online listing, on the website Loopnet.com, initially said the property could be delivered vacant, despite the school district’s lease, which is through September 2017. Hal Zwick, director of commercial real estate at Town and Country, said that online listing had been corrected to address the lease. In an interview yesterday, he said any potential buyer would honor the school district’s lease and might even discuss extending it.
The Schaefers “have owned the property for years, and it was just time to sell,” Mr. Zwick said. “There’s no special reason. It doesn’t make sense for them to own it anymore.”
Mr. Zwick said he had received at least eight phone calls about the property last week and already has “a couple of strong offers.”
“The situation is that the demand for commercial and industrial is high now and there’s not a lot of supply. That’s why the inquiries came so quickly.”